Conatus involves indefinite duration
Formal Statement
The endeavour whereby a thing strives to persist involves no finite time, but an indefinite time. If the conatus contained a built-in time limit determining the thing's duration, then by that same power the thing would eventually cease to exist — but nothing is self-destructive (III.P4). Therefore conatus has no internal expiry.
In Plain Language
Your drive to keep existing does not come with a countdown timer. Spinoza is not saying you are immortal — external causes will eventually undo you. He is saying that nothing in your own nature schedules your end. The striving is open-ended by default. Death is always an intrusion, never a fulfilment. This matters emotionally: if we feel finite, that feeling comes from our encounter with the world, not from some inner awareness of a built-in limit.
Why This Follows
From ce-05 (no self-destruction) and ce-08 (conatus is essence): if the striving included a finite time limit, the thing would at some point destroy itself by its own power, which contradicts III.P4. Therefore the conatus persists indefinitely unless overcome externally.
Conatus has no built-in endpoint; mortality comes only from external causes.
Does the indefinite duration of conatus mean that awareness of our own death is, strictly speaking, always an awareness of something external to our essence?